News Bulletin Unidentified sources report that Thanksgiving, an apparent target in the world-wide Economic War, was killed in a hit and run incident on Main Street, USA, on or about November 1. Hired mercenaries were seen rolling over her as they roared from the east coast to the west wrapping all of America in artificial garland and red ribbon. Thanksgiving, well known for her peaceful political philosophy, is said to have courageously clung to life. She was seen waving her leaf-stenciled banners from city lampposts in non-violent resistance until her final moments. The official cause of death is thought to be aspiration of plastic holly berries made in China that were floating in the tailwind of the assassins.

Thanksgiving was preceded in death by her Grandmothers who lived over the meadow and through the woods; her Mother, the archetypical, stalwart woman who emigrated to America on the Mayflower; her father, Governor William Bradford, who invited all the neighbors in for a grand feast to celebrate her birth in 1621; her husband, Bah Humbug, who liked to eat pumpkin pie but did not like to shop; her sister, Priscilla Alden, made famous in William Wadsworth Longfellow’s New York Times best-seller The Courtship of MilesStandish; a cousin, Sarah Joespha Hale, who successfully campaigned to make Thanksgiving’s birthday a national holiday in 1863 (Sarah is also remembered for her composition of “Mary Had A Little Lamb”); several Daughters and Sons who did not put up a Christmas tree until the calendar said it was December 1; and an uncle, Ebenezer Scrooge. Thanksgiving is survived by a host of Turkeys.

Due to scheduling conflicts throughout the Holiday Season, there will be no funeral services. Memorial gifts may be made to the Martha Stewart Foundation or to Williams and Sonoma who lovingly cared for Thanksgiving during her last frail years of life.

Georgia Green Stamper of Lexington, Kentucky, is organizing a communal sigh at midnight tonight to honor the legacy of the deceased holiday. Stamper urges Americans of all faiths to set their tables with leaf-shaped placemats which can be purchased at Walmart, light candles that are molded into little Pilgrim figures, and remember together Thanksgiving’s slow, elegant stroll through the gray Novembers of yesteryear.Stamper says that Thanksgiving will be missed by all who loved her.